Page 58 of Smokescreen (Knight & Daywalker)
“I do,” he agreed. “But I suspect the girl was only looking at his leg. Or lack of one.”
His...I let my eyes drift down the retreating man’s back, from an impressive pert ass down muscular thighs, and...one shapely calf, and one leg that ended at the knee, followed by metallic thing that looked like modern art. Ah. Well, I’d known that was a thing already, from what Bannockburn had said.
Except...I turned to glare at the woman going the opposite way. “What the hell is wrong with her? Who says a thing like?—”
Davin had to catch me, because my feet went out from under me, and when his arms tightened around my injured ribs, the whole world went a little sideways. I might have whimpered likea small dog, but I would never admit that to anyone. Not even Davin and Twist, who’d witnessed it.
It was then that Davin gave up and went back to carrying me, and I didn’t even protest.
“I might have a broken rib,” I wheezed as he power-walked toward the shop. “Quite possibly. She got in a really good swing on me.”
“Keys,” Davin muttered as he reached the front door, only to pause when Twist was already pulling them out of my jacket pocket, having climbed out to grab them and hold them up for him. “Look at you,” he said, duly impressed. “Certainly cleverer than your da.”
I wanted to glare at him, but honestly, I just didn’t have it in me at that moment. I sighed and accepted being carried across the threshold like a blushing bride in an old story, then laid ever so gently onto the sofa in my apartment office. He left me there a moment, and came back with a damp rag and the first aid kit from under my bathroom sink. Smart man.
He peeled me out of my shirt and tossed it toward the hamper, but I didn’t see if he hit it or not, my whole attention captured by the vampire who was my business partner. He felt my side like it was something he’d done a thousand times before, checking someone for broken ribs. Then he smiled. “Just cracked, I think. Nothing out of place. Going to have a wicked bruise though, and it’s going to hurt a good while.” He glanced up at me and grinned. “Or is that not proper American use of ‘wicked’?”
“I think it’s fine,” I mumbled, and that was weird. I blinked repeatedly, trying to pull myself up a bit, wake up, so I wouldn’t fall asleep while he was checking me over.
He laid a soft hand over the center of my chest, holding me in place with no effort whatsoever. Fucking vampires. “Stay there. It’s not fine. It’s going to hurt you.” He pulled out alcoholswabs, cleaning some abrasions I hadn’t even realized I’d had on my knuckles, cheek, and brow, and then putting a butterfly bandage on the brow. “Don’t think any of the rest of these need bandaging. Now cough for me.”
I lifted a brow at him, but he was unimpressed, so I gave a tiny cough. His expression went even flatter, less impressed, so I tried again, with a little more feeling. And that hurt like a bitch, but I didn’t feel anything moving in my chest.
“You can get a full breath?” he asked. I nodded, so he went back to inspecting me for other, smaller things. As he looked me over, he spoke, almost muttered. “Some people are just like that woman. Anything they think of as an imperfection is awful, and everyone else should be ashamed of it and try to hide it. My da was like that, and I was the imperfection he couldn’t stand.”
I winced at the notion, but I couldn’t offer any equivalent. My mother had been odd, and maybe not a good mother by some people’s standards, but I thought she’d done pretty damn well by me. She had alternately smothered and neglected me, but most of it made perfect sense. She had a more than full-time job, and vampires didn’t have kids. We were in an unprecedented situation.
I could speak on the situation in a more abstract way, though, since Davin had made the opening. “Anyone who only sees that he’s got a prosthetic limb and is disgusted by it is a fucking weirdo. First of all, that thing looks cool as hell. Secondly, that man is gorgeous. Something that sets him apart from other people, makes him unique? It’s only bad because I assume he went through an awful experience to end up in this situation.”
“I agree,” he said, voice quiet and thoughtful. Of course, Davin’s voice was usually quiet and thoughtful. Weird. I was too used to my own company, and that guy? He never shut the fuck up. “And I agree that he’s beautiful.”
“Sweet. We can ogle him together if he jogs by on the regular.”
That broke the somber mood and got him back to laughing. That was right. He should be laughing. He had a nice laugh, warm and rich and beautiful.
It was only when the light flipped off that I realized I was drifting my way to sleep again. This time, though, all the willpower in the world couldn’t have dragged my eyes back open.
CHAPTER 24
Iwoke with heartburn, and that was annoying.
It had never happened before. Heck, I only really knew what it was because of an unfortunate experience with way too much coffee on an empty stomach in my twenties one time.
I hadn’t woken because of the pain, though. I’d woken because there was a noise. A knocking noise, on the front door of the shop.
Twist was sleeping on my chest, so I held her against me as I sat up, making sure she wasn’t disturbed too much. It brought to mind a notion of her lying on my chest as a giant fucking panther, probably crushing the life out of me.
I braced myself, expecting pain from my ribs, or maybe my stomach, where the vamp had punched me, but there was nothing. That was weird. Glancing around Twist’s tiny furry self, I found that my entire side was a bruise. I was purple from nearly my neck to my hipbone, but it didn’t hurt at all.
That was the first part of the experience that made me think maybe I ought to go to the hospital. There should definitely be pain, and if there wasn’t, maybe I was seriously broken.
The knock came again, reminding me why I was getting up. So I stood, letting Twist resettle herself in the crook of my arm as I headed up front.
Davin was sleeping across four of the chairs in the front room with a light blanket slung over his legs, which was...well, it was weird. Wasn’t it? Had he stayed to look after me?
I honestly wasn’t sure what to do with that notion.
Arthur Agincourt was standing at the front door to the shop, carrying a bunch of stuff with him. He smiled bright when he saw me there, holding the stuff up, like maybe I needed to see it in order to open the door for him.
